Kazushi Kimura Is Riding The Wave With Ambitious Intent

KAZUSHI KIMURA pulls into Ontario’s Fort Erie racetrack. It’s a couple of days after he closed out the Del Mar summer meet with a Grade 1 win for Bob Baffert and he’s on his way to ride in the afternoon’s feature, the Prince of Wales Stakes, the second leg of the Canadian Triple Crown.

He rolls down the driver’s side window.

“Excuse me, I’m a jockey and I want to park around there,” he says. A woman’s lilting voice, unmistakably Canadian, responds with helpful concern and a bright tone.

“Ok, the lot’s way at the back there. Do you know how to get there? Go down here and make a left. Ask somebody, they’ll show the way,” she directs.

“Thank you.”

He returns to his hands-free call, apologises for the interruption, and moments later he has parked his car at the destination. He continues to talk where he left off, about the lessons he has taken from his Californian summer, why he left the Woodbine arena he dominated as champion, and the ambitions that drive him.

When it comes to ambition, he knows exactly where he wants to be, and, like the Fort Erie parking lot, he has a good idea of how to get there but appreciates that he needs a hand of help from the right people along the way.

“I’ve always had high expectations,” he says.

To be the best?

“One hundred percent,” he confirms.

“In this business, you always need opportunities and every day you have to prove and improve yourself,” he continues. “Right now, I can see that I have a good opportunity to step up and I just need more achievements to do that: I mean, I already have had good opportunities and had good achievements, but I need something more now.”

Kimura arrived in Canada from Japan in 2018 at age 18, a dropout from the JRA (Japan Racing Association)’s apprentice jockey school. He was the best in his class, a rider with natural talent and a desire to improve; but he has an independent mind, his own way of approaching things that puts him outside of the rigid lines the conformist JRA sets.

He could have stayed in his lane, played the role expected of a JRA apprentice and graduated into the jockey ranks; having left, he could have taken the safe option of applying to ride on Japan’s second-tier ‘local’ circuit, the NAR (National Association of Racing), which is so often the back-up for those who don’t make it on the JRA.   

But neither scenario fits Kimura’s life aims. He left, solo, for Toronto and a meteoric rise: two Sovereign Awards as Canada’s champion apprentice; an Eclipse Award as North America’s leading apprentice; three consecutive jockey titles at Woodbine, in runaway style.

The latest of those three championships was achieved in 2023 with 161 wins, 32 clear of his nearest rival, and his horses earned CAN$7.1 million. His overall North American tallies for the years 2021-23 brought year-end scores of 140, 175 and 175, and annual earnings of US$5.1 million, US$7.7 million and US$8.1 million.

“So many people said I’d be better to stay (at Woodbine) because the opportunities were coming, but I thought maybe I should do something different: I’d been dominant for three years,” he says.

The bare numbers at this juncture would give some weight to those who doubted his summer relocation to California. With little more than three months of the year to run, his win tally is at 78 wins and his earnings are US$4.8 million. His Del Mar summer meet figures showed him in a solid sixth place with 18 wins for $1.6 million in earnings.

“Moneywise, it might have been better to stay at Woodbine where the money’s not bad and I can collect more winners. But Del Mar is top class and has better horses,” he says.

Kimura’s bare stats might not measure up to his Woodbine days, but the connections he has made in California during the last two winters, this spring, and again this summer, are starting to pay off. They did so most handsomely at Del Mar’s final weekend when he snared the G2 John C. Mabee Stakes on the Philip D’Amato-trained Hang The Moon, and the G1 Debutante Stakes on Tenma for the world-famous Baffert stable.  

“I think I made the right decision,” he says.

“After winning the Group 1 and Group 2, riding for those big-name Hall of Famers, I was really happy: I really appreciate that I’ve been given the opportunity to ride those nice horses for them. It’s a big credit having the horse from Bob Baffert, it’s giving me more confidence and then with confidence it’s easier to do the right things.”

Kimura knows his time at Del Mar, and at Santa Anita before that, has improved him, riding against the likes of Frankie Dettori, Mike Smith, Juan Hernandez, Flavien Prat, Antonio Fresu and Umberto Rispoli.

“Racing with them, I’m always learning different things. I can tell I’ve improved more than usual. It’s tough to say how, but California is a little different racing style compared to Woodbine. At Woodbine you’re able to be patient until the top of the stretch. Any time, we can feel like we can come off (the turn) flying,” he says.

“But in California, we’re going to have to stay closer (to the pace), get the position, especially on the dirt. I’d say I’ve learnt to show up on the speed from the gate and have more hustle to get the position. That has been key, being more aggressive from the gate but still not going crazy, doing it with control.”

There was another element to his decision to ride Del Mar, though. This year it is the venue for the Breeders’ Cup, and Kimura is targeting that storied two-day fixture in early November, and the Kentucky Derby, which he has ridden the last two years, as windows to show the world what he’s about.

“It was important to be at Del Mar getting the experience riding the track. Now I’m more confident to say I know this racetrack and that was a big key. And I’m having a good experience, so that’s what I needed before the Breeders’ Cup,” he says.

“I just hope I get a couple of nice mounts for the Breeders’ Cup and that they run well for me. I hope I can win one of those races, then the more I can prove myself, those achievements will always help my racing stats. To get the good horses (consistently) you have to win those types of races.”

Kimura’s Breeders’ Cup book is not certain yet. After the Prince of Wales Stakes he heads back to Woodbine for its big day of four Grade 1 races, the Woodbine Mile, E. P. Taylor Stakes, Natalma Stakes and Summer Stakes, then he’ll go to Santa Anita for its autumn meet opening weekend at the end of September with a host of big races headed by the G1 California Crown.

“I’m bouncing around between California and Canada right now, trying to collect Breeders’ Cup mounts,” he says.

Hang The Moon could be a sweet option for the Filly & Mare Turf, but he has also been approached to ride the Japanese filly Alice Verite. He says he appreciates the connections he has with his homeland that have brought him a Kentucky Derby ride in each of the last two years, firstly on Mandarin Hero and then on the horse he rode to fifth place, T O Password.

“Since I rode Mandarin Hero to second in the Santa Anita Derby last year, the JRA and NAR both now contact me to try to get mounts for me. I’m really happy to have this position right now,” he says.

“NAR always wants to know if I want to come to ride there, but I love to stay in California for the winter.”

At 24, Kimura is in no hurry to return to Japan. His focus is fixed firmly towards making his name in the U.S. and internationally. He has conquered Woodbine, now he feels he needs to establish his reputation in the United States, starting with Southern California, and if he’s successful, then he can look to the East Coast, and to Europe where he hopes one day to make the most of an old connection he has with Wesley Ward and win at Royal Ascot.

“At my age, I’m trying to establish myself in the States, and as a native Japanese maybe it’s better to keep riding in different countries. I don’t know, maybe in 10 years, at age 35, or one-time, I might be able to spend time in Japan for the winter, but for now I need to build up my status in North American racing,” he says.

And he believes more young Japanese jockeys should travel and gain experience race-riding outside of Japan, a sentiment shared by one of his heroes, Japan’s greatest jockey, Yutaka Take, who expressed a similar view at the Asian Racing Conference in Sapporo in August.

“Yutaka went to California when he was young, and to France,” Kimura says, and adds that Yuichi Fukunaga also rode a spell in California and had the same agent there that he has, Brian Beach.

“As a Japanese we love to get experience all the time. We can already make good money in Japan but we just want to learn different stuff by going outside.

“Some young jockeys are going to Australia or France for a couple of months, just to learn some different things, but I have been doing that, studying those processes, ever since I started as a professional jockey in Canada.

“I can tell I have benefitted from having good experiences travelling in the world outside of Japan, that’s important for me. I’m getting better and better every year and I’m happy travelling around, learning in different places and countries. This is really good stuff for me and improves my skills and experiences as a jockey.”

He hopes that what he has achieved already, and what he hopes to achieve in the future, will inspire other young Japanese jockeys to follow his lead.

“It’s about broadening the mind, doing something different: maybe for some jockeys it’s after failing the JRA exam, or just feeling like they can be a jockey but still have the option to travel around, just like me, going out of Japan to get a licence. Especially because of my achievements, maybe they’ll be like, ‘I want to be like him.’ So maybe I can make that dream for some of them.”

Kimura’s dream is still in the making. He stresses again that the Breeders’ Cup is ‘key’ for him to enhance his profile: he knows he needs those big wins if he is to continue climbing to the pinnacle of his field, to be mentioned in the same breath as Irad Ortiz, Ryan Moore, Christophe Lemaire, Joao Moreira, Christophe Soumillon, James McDonald, Zac Purton, Dettori, or, dare one even say it? Take.

But that’s his ambition and right now his trajectory looks good. Fort Erie isn’t Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May, it certainly isn’t the final destination he’s aiming towards, but it is one of the stop-offs on the journey that have got him to where he is.

His mount finished seventh in the Prince of Wales, but four days later at Woodbine that ‘bouncing around’ paid off with a Grade 1 victory in the E.P.Taylor, a spectacular make-all ride on the Kevin Attard-trained mare Full Count Felicia.

He’s shown already that he’s brave enough and determined enough to take the road less travelled, to make hard decisions to get on the right route for him, that he believes will get him to where he wants to be. That’s Kimura’s way and he’ll take the rough as well as the smooth and live by his choices.

“This business, this career, is going to be over 20 or 30 years, so the good things and the bad things will happen,” he says, then adds, “I’m on the flow, just following the wave.”

Don’t be fooled by the ‘chill’ vibe though, Kimura’s wave is moving hard and fast, it’s building momentum, and just maybe it’s ready to break with a splash where the turf meets the surf at Del Mar in November.